Lightning for Hire
by DragonintheLibrary
Summary: Complete the job. Get paid. Disappear. Unfortunately for this mercenary she's now part of some sick game, one she's not planning on losing even if it means breaking the rules and getting involved herself. With the madman in charge of this battle to the death, it might even force Sophia to do a job for free. F/F
1. Chapter 1

The sun was setting as a tall blonde woman made her way with purposeful steps towards a seemingly abandoned warehouse. She scanned the accompanying warehouses for any signs of movement with barely a turn of her head in case someone was watching but she did not sense any threat so far. The area was relatively quiet, her booted feet making surprisingly little noise on the pavement as she neared her destination. Reaching the warehouse, Sophia dark attire blended well with the shadow of the building before she pulled the door open with an annoying squeak and quickly let herself in.

Inside she turned towards the stairs where a dim light could be seen emanating from and she swiftly took two steps at a time. Once at the top, her eyes skimmed over a relatively smartly dressed Japanese man standing by a cluttered table but soon fell on a far more interesting sight. Opposite the man sat two women, dressed in matching skimpy leather outfits of purple and pink, both unconscious and restrained to the chairs they were slumped on.

"Bring strippers to all your dealings Dai?" A German accented voice asked, removing her gaze from the bound women.

Dai's head shot up from his task at the cluttered desk, a slightly surprised look on his face as he simply responded, "What?" He glanced at his watch before muttering an "oops" to himself.

"You know I'm all for free love and whatever but if you want to do _whatever,_ " Sophia looked pointedly at the two women before returning her gaze, "do it in the privacy of your own home. Don't go bringing your weird bondage hookers to work. I don't need to see that shit."

"Ha. Ha. Ha." Dai responded sarcastically.

"Plus," she paused briefly as she contemplated the women's fate for a moment, "with our line of work, we might have to kill them if they wake up." She finished casually.

"Why are they asleep?" Sophia asked almost as an afterthought.

"They're intruders!" He defended himself. "I had to use my knock out gas to put them down, I'm not that unprofessional."

"Wait that's all you're denying?"

Dai only gave a wicked grin in response.

Shaking her head with an amused smile she moved on, "How did they even manage to get in? Is your security that bad any random stripper and her sister can get in?"

"No it's great, don't doubt my tech skills. It's not my fault they came in through the roof. They might be spies." He suggested in a hurry to defend himself.

"What spy dresses like that?" She gestured to the other women. "Where would they even hide their gear in those outfits? They probably were in the next building over, getting drunk or high and got locked on the roof. They'll probably call the police though, might want to get rid of them." Sophia moved toward the table, planning to hurry this meeting along.

"Will you help?"

"Hell no," She laughed. "I'm just here to get my payment, they're your mess to clear up. Deal with it."

"Deal with us?" An outraged feminine voice yelled from behind Sophia.

Spinning around to see the violet suit wearing woman freed from her bonds and looking very pissed, Sophia raised her hands in a show of peace. "Chill sweetheart, you've had a bit much to drink or smoke and passed out. He was just going to drop you off at the nearest red light district and you can find your way home from there." After a beat she added. "Or your next client."

"What are you implying?!" She was fuming by this point.

"That you're a hooker." Dai helpfully supplied.

The woman turned her glare to him as Sophia chuckled dropping her hands, if looks could kill.

"You bastard!" She yelled, her hands lighting up with electricity as her anger grew before being released forward luckily missing Dai directly in her anger. The floor beneath his feet exploded sending him flying backwards, the force strong enough to expand and slam into Sophia as well.

The mercenary only having the barest moment to react and shield herself from most of the wooden shards, avoiding any direct hits to the chest. She went flying back, colliding with wooden wall as pain rips itself through her back before she dropped to the floor.

"Fuck," She cursed, looking up through watering eyes to see the other woman yelling at Dai. The words were fuzzy to Sophia, crackling in her ears as an after shock of the attack.

Dai somehow managed to regain his footing and dived, or more accurately fell, forwards to take cover behind the table. However, the protection didn't last long as she powered up again, shotting lightning from her palm, shattering the table and knocking him back again. She quickly advanced on him, hands sparking dangerously.

Not giving herself time to even try and comprehend the weirdness of this situation, Sophia went for her weapon but reconsidered attacking the main target, not wanting to get instantly fried. Flicking her gaze to the remaining unconscious woman, Sophia grunted as she pushed herself from the floor, feeling off balanced with what sounded like a storm thundering in her ears. She sprinted as fast as she could to the occupied chair, pulling out the knife she pressed it to the other woman's throat. Making sure she had a good grip on the woman and keeping the knife tight to her throat in case this one woke up and lit up like a hay wiring Christmas tree.

"Hey lightning bitch," She yelled, unsure of her own volume with her ears still ringing.

Said bitch whipped around, hands lighting up even more at the sight before her. "Let go of my sister!" She yelled.

"Sister?" Sophia smirked her first instincts having been correct, "Looks like I have the advantage here then."

She only growled in response before finding her voice. "Let her go or I'll kill your friend!" She yelled feeling as if she had one upped the blonde.

Laughing Sophia gripped the woman's hair, pulling it to reveal more neck to her knife. "I'm really not that attached to him, you on the other hand seem to actually care if my hostage lives." She felt the woman beneath her hand stir and she pressed the knife tighter to her throat, drawing a droplet of blood.

Startled the woman hissed in pain and panicked briefly at being restrained before falling still. Her breathing suddenly becoming laboured to which Sophia attributed to fear setting in.

"You bitch!" The angry woman yelled at the sight of her sister's blood, charging up her electricity she fired at the woman hurting her sister without hesitation.

The blast collided with Sophia's right shoulder, messing with the nerves in her hand, forcing her to drop the knife as she dropped to her knees. The knife clattered to the floor, redder than it should have been and the blonde only got a moment to look up before she was hit again directly in her shoulder causing her to fly backwards with the force of the hit, colliding with another wall. Pain rips itself through her right shoulder making her gasp for air as she tried to focus around the pain and not think about what damage was being down to her back, hoping it was voiding her spine. She'd felt far worse from a fight before but never from a single hit before.

The other woman approached her, tempted to finish her off or to teach her a lesson about messing with her sister.

"Wait," The bound woman let out a breathy plea at the sight of what her sister planned to do. "It's her." She said faintly before freeing herself, bringing a hand to a thankfully shallow cut that was clotting quickly.

Confused for a moment at her sister's response and angered by the sight of blood, she hesitated before realising what was happening. "No," she whispered, her lightning fading out as she continued, "She can't be. We already found him." She claimed weakly.

"What the fuck are you two on about?" Sophia groaned, puzzled by their conversation and angry at herself for being in this position. "What even are you two?" She asked, trying to pull herself up with her left arm. Maybe she could get them to postpone electrocuting with an explanation and give her some time to recover and figure out how to win this.

Hearing the other woman voice, the violet suited woman regained some of her anger and stepped towards Sophia, sure her sister was mistaken, and this couldn't be their destined one. However as soon as she stepped alongside her sister, she suddenly felt weak. Her face grew hot and her breath became laboured.

The freed woman seeing her sister's reaction smiled slightly, glad they weren't reacting to different people, and made her way over to the fallen woman. She all but collapsed upon Sophia when she came too close and leaned in whispering, "We are your sekirei." Before pulling the disoriented blonde into a kiss.

Slowed by pain, Sophia was unable to react in time to prevent the kiss and when she went to push her away, bright pink wings sprouted from her neck, almost blinding her. Without much hesitation, the other woman too dropped upon her and when one kiss ended another began, followed by violet wings of lights.

They both drew back and recited, "We're the pledged thunderclap. No disaster will hit our Ashikabi."

"Your sekirei, no. 11 Hikari, now and forever."

"Your sekirei, no.12 Hibiki, now and forever."

"What the actual fuck?"


	2. Chapter 2

**AN: Updated some errors in the previous chapters and did a bit of editing but nothing too big. Know it's been awhile but here's chapter two, finally.**

* * *

 _"What the actual fuck?"_

Sophia pushed the twins away from her, though in her weakened state it was pretty feeble, and pulled herself back as far as she could until her bruised back was pressed against the dented wall. "Why the hell did you do that? And what the hell was that light? What are you two?" She half yelled in confusion and concern at what she was dealing with.

"Hmph." The one who had been attacking her huffed, clearly not too impressed by the blonde and not in the mood to talk to her. "You couldn't have waited a minute before winging yourself Hibiki?" She asked her sister exacerbated.

Hibiki shrugged shyly as she glanced at the human, still feeling the warm flush all over her body at their close proximity. "It was such a strong reaction though, far more than I felt for him." She said softly, "And I was worried if I didn't you'd kill her, and we'd never be with our true ashikabi."

"We still should have discussed it." Hikari grumpily responded before muttering, "I probably would have only maimed her."

Sophia looked between the two women befuddled, half tempted to think they were mad if not for witnessing one of them summoning lightning and feeling that it was very much real lightning. She was tempted to interrupt but hoped their talking would give her more time to figure out what the hell to do. Such as if she could draw her gun and shoot the both of them before they got a chance to zap her again. However, this idea was short lived as the angrier one turned her attention back to her.

"What are we?" She partly sneered. "We just told you, we're sekirei and as for what happened. You just winged us and are now our ashikabi, so you better not be a worthless one." Crossing her arms over her chest, she glared down at Sophia.

Their ashikabi just blinked in response wondering if her brain had been fried. Were those words meant to mean anything to her? Could being struck by lightning lose you a chunk of your vocabulary. "Zero of anything you just said made any sense. What the fuck is a sekirei? Or an ashikabi?"

Sighing in annoyance, Hikari took a breath to yell at her ashikabi for being an idiot and that in fact she made perfect sense but luckily her sister got there first.

"A sekirei is a superpowered person who each have different abilities which they use to fight in the Sekirei Plan in order to win the game for their ashikabi, who is a human and their destined partner. Once winged, when they kiss, the sekirei and ashikabi form an unbreakable bond which in turn releases a sekirei's true power." She calmly explained, still basically sprawled on the floor by the human.

"Wait, so that kiss made you both stronger?" Sophia asked, cursing the fact that it would now make the women harder to defeat.

"Basically." Hikari responded, her palms sparking up in response as she grinned at the human.

Something clicked inside her head and suddenly the lightning didn't scare her as much, if she was right anyway. "You said unbreakable bond." She half stated, half questioned the quieter sister. "As in death do us part unbreakable?" The sister nodded in response. "What happens if I die? Do you lose your powers?" She asked, hoping this was true so that the ladies would be less inclined to off her and perhaps give her an advantage if she was the only one willing to kill.

The sisters exchanged a look, the lightning dying down and Hibiki all but whispered, "If you die, we die." She couldn't lie to her ashikabi and even with her sister's rage, she knew Hikari wouldn't be able to do more than shock their destined one now they were winged, and they could feel the bond between them.

Sophia had to hold back her smile at that, assuming it was true, she had no immediate death threat from these creatures. Even if it wasn't true, it only matter that they believed her death would mean their own. Using her left arm that had not been hit, she slowly moved it towards her back, playing it off as readjusting her position for comfort. Her fingertips found the metal of her handgun as she tried to hide her actions as best she could, moving gradually closer. "So, you said there was some game to do with all this?" She asked, attempting to distract them.

Shaking her head to clear the thoughts of her and her sister's death, Hikari returned to crossing her arm, the sparks long gone. "Yes, we're all taking part in a huge battle in this city under the watchful gaze of the gamemaster. We fight and terminate other sekirei until we're the final ones left and will ascend with our ashikabi." She stated with confidence in their ability to win but with underlying bored tone. At least Seo understood what sekirei and ashikabi were so she didn't have to explain her very being to someone, even if he was a creep when he talked about sekirei and the winging process.

"Ascend?" She was so close, her grip almost secure as her forefinger found the safety latch.

"The reward at the end, the sekirei and their ashikabi ascend to the heavens together where a great prize is waiting for them." Hibiki answered.

Dal groaned from where he was lying under the wreckage of the table causing both twins attention to turn to him. Sophia seeing her opportunity, fully intended to end this here and now when a dark thought stopped her dead in her tracks. What if this bond went both ways? What if I kill them only for my death to follow a few moments later?

 _"Fuck sake."_ She curses internally before releasing her grip on her gun. She couldn't risk it and she couldn't very well ask them if she was right. They could just lie to her or she would just tip them off. Gritting her teeth, she pushed herself up with her left arm, keeping her right tight to her body to avoid the pain shooting through her arm.

Hibiki was first to turn back, her sister on attack alert, and went to assist her ashikabi but a glare kept her from touching the other woman. With a sad look in her eyes, she also stood up and stepped closing to her sister, finding comfort in their closeness.

Coughing slightly, causing herself a lot of pain and drawing Hikari's attention, Sophia addressed the twins, "Well it seems this fight is over and since we're bonded for life or whatever, how about you power down." She pointedly looked at Hikari before moving her sore body over to her knife.

"So, what now?" Hikari asked slightly annoyed but putting out her lightning. "I assume you've got an apartment?"

Sophia frowned somewhat at that comment as she slowly bent to pick up the knife, pulling out a tissue to wipe off the blood and putting it back in its sheath. "No," She said turning back and pulling an 'are you serious?' face. Apparently unbreakable bond meant she had to house them too, basically marriage then. "I don't live in Tokyo." She continued before the angrier sister could interrupt. "I'm staying in a hotel, one that probably won't let you in dressed like that." She looked them up and down, still confused by their attire.

"You'll have to manage then because a sekirei needs to stay close to her ashikabi." Hikari stated as if it was an undeniable fact.

Feeling how tired her body was and with no adrenaline helping her to keep going, Sophia didn't bother to argue. She'd have to put up with these lightning twins until she figured a way out of this mess and how much they could injure each other. She really didn't want to get struck by lightning again any time soon. She may be tough, but she wasn't a masochist. "Fine whatever. Go wait downstairs while I deal with this then." Sophia said, leaving no room for arguments, superpowers or not, if she was stuck with them they were going to have to learn to listen to her.

"Okay." Hibiki said, smiling a bit in response, glad their ashikabi wasn't fighting them on the living arrangements and seemed to be taking her role in stride. Grabbing her sister's arm so she couldn't stay and protest, she pulled her behind her as they headed for the stairs.

Sighing once they were gone, Sophia moved sluggishly towards Dal, trying to stretch out her back a bit as she went. Once close enough, she dropped down rather painfully to check for injuries and stirred the man into consciousness.

"Wha-" He groaned, disorientated. "What happened? Where are the crazy strippers?" He exclaimed the last question, shooting into a sitting position before instantly regretting it.

"I dealt with it." Sophia stated bluntly, wanting to get this dealt with as quickly as possible and not wanting to get into the details of what had happened. "Where's the money?"

He looked confused for a moment before reaching out and grabbing a bag that had fell to the floor in the destruction of the table. Opening the bag and withdrawing a thick envelope, he spoke, "The rest was transferred to the account you specified along with a bonus."

She merely raised her eyebrow.

"The client was pleased."

"Aren't they always?" She joked.

"True." He grinned. "You keep me very popular. Speaking of which I might need you again soon, so maybe don't leave the country or at least not to one with a long flight journey." He handed over the envelope.

Taking it and putting it in her jacket, she shrugged. "We'll see." Standing up, she briefly looked around. "I'll leave you to clean up."

Dal did not look pleased at that prospect. "You're not going to help?"

"You brought them here. You failed to secure them or check them properly for weapons, so you get to clean up."

Groaning as he let his head drop to the floor, Dal responded, "Fine. But I could have sworn they weren't armed." He sighed again. "Guess I'll have to look into who they could have been and why they were following me." He paused, "Or you."

She merely shrugged, "They didn't seem to have either us as their target. If so they were partially sloppy."

"They were dressed weird, more hooker than assassin."

"Maybe Johns are getting more dangerous or they were looking for 007."

Laughing at the idea of a bond girl appearing at their meeting, Dal shook his head. "No matter. They're dealt with and if we have any other weirdly dressed would be assassins, we'll put it up to priority. For now, I have a mess to clean up." He pulled himself to his feet with an assist from Sophia.

"Enjoy." She said before turning and walking to and down the stairs. She was not looking forward to the journey back to the hotel or anything else involving these so called sekirei.


	3. Chapter 3

**UN: So I wrote this chapter on a train yesterday, feeling a bit on a bit of a roll with writing atm so enjoy the 3rd chapter to this story. :) Though I probably won't be updating anything more this month, any of you reading my other sekirei fics, I will be getting round to updating them too.**

* * *

The twins looked up, ceasing their hushed conversation as Sophia slowly made her way down the stairs, her face set against the pain of the movement. Reaching the bottom, she walked straight past the women and headed out the door. She kept a quick pace despite her injuries, wanting to be as far away from the warehouse as soon as possible. While unlikely in the pretty much abandoned area, she didn't want to stick around in case someone had heard all the noise and called the police. Getting picked up by the police was the last thing she wanted, especially with the two scantily clad woman behind her. She'd probably get detained for being their pimp or something similar.

"Exactly how far away is this hotel of yours?" Hikari asked frustratedly after 10 minutes of walking in silence.

Sophia chose to ignore her, focusing more on putting one foot in front of the other. The lightning and collision with nearly all the walls of that warehouse had taken its toll and she was not looking forward to accessing the damage when she got back. The fact that she was walking was a good sign at least, meant no major damage had been done to her back or spine. Her shoulder on other hand, she wasn't so sure about.

"Hey, I-" She started to shout before her sister interrupted her in a quieter tone, placing her hand on the louder sister's arm.

"Maybe we should let her think, this is probably a lot for a human with no prior knowledge of sekirei to come to grips with. That and you did kind of electrocute her." She tried to reason.

"It's not my fault if her brain can't keep up and I only wanted to know how far we have left to go. And she threatened to stab you!" She all but yelled her response, her volume increasing the longer she spoke.

Sighing in frustration and a little pain, Sophia stopped abruptly and spun around. "Will you two shut up." She said voice cold, shocking the twins into silence for the moment. She pressed on before they regained their voices. "You're drawing attention to us. So, both of you zip it until we're inside and out of everyone's fucking earshot." She turned back around and kept walking at a faster pace. The twins glanced at each other but stayed silent.

Despite the hour, the pavements were still pretty busy, and it pained Sophia more than she would admit to force her aching body to weave around the other rushing pedestrians. She almost let out a relieved sigh when she saw the front of her hotel building come into view, until she remembered she had to sneak in two scantily clad women and that she herself probably didn't even look too good after been zapped all over the place. _"Shit."_

Once they were close enough to see the entrance, Sophia slowed her pace and came to a stop out of the hustle and bustle of all the pedestrians in a doorway of a closed shop. Turning to the sisters who had joined her she said, "Go wait around the back side of the building coming up. There should be fire exit door and some bins beside it. Stay there. Don't talk to anyone and don't draw more attention to yourself that your outfits already do." She gave them a stern look, leaving no room for arguments and glared down the response that Hikari was forming at the jab at their outfits. Hibiki just crossed her arms over her chest and looked down.

Taking the silence as confirmation, Sophia left them to follow her orders and walked up to the hotel entrance. She got a side eye look from the doorman, but he seemed to remember her from when she'd left the hotel earlier, or the very least looked familiar enough to let her pass. Once in the main reception hall she scanned the reception area and not seeing who she was looking for made her way to the lift, stepping in just as it was about to close and giving a small strained smile and nod at the couple already occupying it. The woman returned it but the man merely gave her a once over before moving his gaze away, not giving her a second thought. Pressing the button to the 6th floor with her good arm, she tried to move as little as possible as the lift started.

She left the couple, taking a left out of the lift and walking down the corridor. Luckily no one seemed to be about, but she didn't allow herself too much of a grimace as she reached into her jacket to get her key card. She knew of the cameras in this hall way and despite them not being able to see her face from the position she was in, she didn't want to do anything that might cause someone to come check up on her or worse.

Managing to pull out her card without too much pain, she slid it into the card reader and entered her room. Walking straight past her packed bags by the door, she went to the room service phone and dialled. As it rang, she briefly thought about delaying bringing in the twins or leaving them entirely, but she didn't know what these creatures were fully capable off and if they would be able to track her down. She didn't need lightning women stalker her across the globe and she couldn't risk them doing something stupid if she left them outside. She needed to sort this mess out before she left the country. She couldn't leave any loose ends.

The phone connected, "Express room cleaning service, how may I help you."

"Hey Ikuo, I need a favour."

* * *

Hibiki stayed staring at the floor as her ashikabi walked away, shame colouring her face. If only their outfits were more modest, then they wouldn't be causing extra issues for her and could just walk in with her. She knew it wasn't just their outfits that was causing the tension between the sekirei and their human, but she had had no control over the other reasons, and she wanted to make her destined one happy, despite how they met. They were meant to be together and meant to make each other stronger after all, but so far, they had only made her weaker.

A frustrated sigh from her sister broke her from her increasingly depressing thoughts, and at the look of anger on her sister's face she felt guilt over the situation she had got them in. She knew from her reaction to the human that she was meant to be their true ashikabi and that they would end up happy and strong because of it. But that didn't shake the guilt of forcing her sister into this relationship without talking to her.

"The nerve of that woman." Hikari growled, mimicking her sister pose but rather with a glare directed at the other women's back. "Commanding us like dogs and insulting us. What right does she have to just boss us around while looking at us like we were some pests to her." She continued angrily, working herself up.

"Well she is our ashikabi, that gives her the right to tell us what to do." Hibiki quietly stated when Hikari took a breath.

Turning the glare to her sister she spit out, "And who's fault is that."

Looking down at the comment, Hibiki couldn't think of a response, knowing her sister was right.

Sighing again Hikari reached out to her sister. "Look I didn't mean to snap, it's not your fault she's bossing us around like that. You couldn't have known how's she'd treat us when you winged yourself."

Looking up at her sister she tried for a smile as she nodded toward the building. "We should probably head over, we don't know when she'll be down to get us." Frowning slightly, Hikari nodded as they started to walk over, not saying a word until they saw the exit door sign.

"I just can't believe we're winged to this violent and rude woman." She started again as they waited around by the door.

"Well you did attack her, so she's hardly had reason to warm to us." Hibiki defended.

"I was just defending us from that pervert she was with! And she called us prostitutes!" She yelled.

"Shhh." Hibiki tried to quieten her sister, not wanting to attract attention and angry their already angry ashikabi.

"I just can't believe we could react to someone like that, especially so strongly." The last part was said softly, hand to chest as if her body had betrayed her in choosing this particular human.

"And Seo would have been better?" Hibiki asked somewhat accusatorily.

Before Hikari could respond however, the back door opened, and a young man's smirking face popped out. His smirk only grew at the sight of them and he said almost to himself, "Well she wasn't wrong, there is definitely no way I could miss you two ladies." He pulled the door open fully and indicated for them to come in. "I'm Ikuo, here to escort you to Miss Wolff's room."

* * *

As she put the phone down, she considering dealing with her wounds but thought better than to leave the twins to their own devices when they reached her room. Instead she pulled out some cash from the envelope, counting it and putting it in her back pocket. Walking to her packed bags, highly doubtful that she was leaving today like planned, she froze as she felt her phone vibrating painfully against her shoulder. Carefully extracted it from her jacket she looked at the blocked number on her screen. Clicking the answer button, she brought it closer to her ear but stayed silent.

"Congratulation! You have winged the lightning twin sekirei and are now a participant in the great Sekirei Plan! " The male voice yelled, making Sophia glad she hadn't put it straight to her ear. "I am Minaka Hiroto, the magnificent game master and might I say you are a much better ashikabi than the original one those two birds planned to wing. So congratulations!"

"Thanks." Sophia managed to say, internally swearing. This shit situation had taken on a whole new level with the CEO of MBI calling her on her cellphone. _"Shit."_

"Now, now Miss Wolff. Some enthusiasm would be nice. Afterall, there is a grand prize to be won at the end of the game. A reward that you could only dream of." He chided.

"Oh yeah?" She asked, her tone conveying her lack of interest. "And what's that then?"

"Ah ah ah. I can't tell you that." Sophia just rolled her eyes. "You must find out when you win the great Sekirei Plan!" She really wished he'd stop yelling into the phone.

"Okay I'll just win then." She did not plan to stick around long enough to compete in this game let alone stay to win it.

"Good good, I like that attitude. Now remember this is a secret game and disclosing it to anyone outside of the game will end very badly for you Miss Wolff." He threatened in a somewhat still cheery tone. "Now enjoy your sekirei and fight so that you can ascend!" And with that he hung up on her.

She gripped the phone tightly. _"Well shit."_ She took a deep breath that hurt to do but centered her. This was just getting worse and worse but there was one good thing that phone call told her. He didn't know her name and she'd like to keep it that way. _"I'd better not give him reason to look into me."_ She thought looking down at the phone.

She heard a knock on the door. _"But first things first."_


	4. Chapter 4

**AN: Hey looks its only been 3 months on this one but found some inspiration and time to write so enjoy :) Reviews always appreciated and those reading my other sekirei stories, I'll try and get round to updating them too. (Also the italics seem to be disappearing when I've uploaded chapters so that's weird but haven't got all my old chapters still on here so will have to try and fix future chapters instead. As usual, little errors fixed in the last chapter too but nothing major.)**

* * *

Moving to the door she pocketed her phone then pulled the door open to the cheery face of Ikuo and the sullen and angry faces, representatively, of Hibiki and Hikari. She motioned with her head for them to enter, trying to limit the movement of her body but not too obviously, and Hikari pushed past her escort, her sister trailing behind as they entered the room, looking around with a huff.

Chuckling slightly, Ikuo stepped into the room slightly so as to be out of view from the corridor. "Good evening Miss Wolff, hope you're having a pleasant stay." He said holding out his hand.

"Evening." She said, not really in the mood for any of this and reached into her back pocket, palming the money before gripping his hand in a fake handshake. "The cameras?" She asked in a lower tone so it wouldn't carry. He merely gave her a 'do you think I'm an ameteur' look and she smiled slightly as she released her grip and thanked him at a normal volume.

Nodding him to leave and ever the professional, Ikuo gave a once over of the two sekirei, smirking before winking at Sophia and leaving with. "I do hope you enjoy your evening Miss."

As the door closed, Sophia heard Hikari mutter, "Pervert." And She just gave another deep sigh, a thing she felt she'd be doing a lot around these women. Ignoring them she went over to one of her packed bags and painfully picked it up, not paying any mind to the wince that emulated from one of her sekirei as she did so. Standing up right, she gave them a look and said. "It's late. I'm cleaning up and going to sleep. I'll deal with this in the morning."

"Fine." Hikari grumbled as Hibiki nodded. "But where are we meant to sleep? There's only one bedroom and I'm not sharing a bed with you."

"Good." Sophia responded giving her a 'what the fuck' look at the implication Sophia wanted them anywhere near her bed or unconscious and undefended body, they'd just tried to kill each other. "Sleep on the sofa or the fucking floor for all I care, just don't disturb me." Hikari glared at her, lips in a tight line as her sister stared at the floor gripping her stomach.

She strode towards her room, wanting to be done with this when a quiet voice stopped her in her tracks as she reached the doorway. "Ashikabi, do you have any food here? We haven't eaten all day."

Sophia looked back to meet her meeker sekirei's eyes, before rolling them. _"I have to bloody feed them too?"_ Before nodding to the table the phone was one. "Room service, order something." Then thinking quickly about how they looked, nodded to the complimentary gown. "And cover up when you answer the door." She went to leave but not before adding, "And fucking don't call me that." She firmly shut the door behind her, done with the women for today, wishing she could be done with them for good already. She didn't hear the quiet "thank you" mumbled back.

Dropping the bag by her bed, she reached in for her toiletries and first aid kit, before heading to the bathroom. At a time like this she wished she's booked a suite with a bath but doubted she could relax her muscles with the company she was keeping. She might even run the risk of not being to lift herself out with her injuries, so instead she was looking forward to a hot shower. Removing her clothes and gear was a painful task and she kept her knife in reach of the shower in case the locked bathroom door didn't deter attackers. She glances down at her right shoulder and could see tree branch like scars had made its way down most of her arm and side, streaking out from the point the lightning must have hit. Gently she ran her finger along the scar, hissing slightly at the pain it still caused, as if the lightning was still coursing through her.

Looking up to face the mirror, she turned to have her back facing it and examined it from over her shoulder. Her back was already darkening in horrible purple bruises, indicating how badly she must have collided with those walls since most of her back was just a bruised mess. She was lucky nothing seemed to have pierced the skin but she was definitely going to be hurting for a while.

Deciding to shower before dealing with her back, she turned on the shower to only a lukewarm temperature, not wishing to aggravate her lightning burns more than just moving did and stepped in. This was going to be a painful endeavour.

* * *

The door shut firmly and with shoulders slumped, Hibiki went over the the room service menu.

"She's right."

Hibiki looked at her sister, shocked, "What?"

"We shouldn't call her ashikabi, she hasn't earned that title and she sure as hell doesn't act like a proper ashikabi." Hikari crossed her arms and glared at the closed door.

Picking up the menu and slumping onto the sofa, she shrugged. "We just need to give her time, our bodies wouldn't react if she wasn't our chosen one."

"Hmpth, I wouldn't be so sure of that." She mumbled but before she could say anything her stomach rumbled, reminding her how long they'd been searching without food. "Well at least she doesn't seem to be worried about money, that's a step up from what our other situation would have been like." Hikari said moving over to the sofa to join her sister.

Hibiki smiled at the point, adding, "Maybe we won't have to go to that job on Monday now."

Hikari snatched the menu as she plopped herself down, smirking at her sister. "No stupid job and an not exactly ashikabi that can afford room service, we should enjoy to moment while we can and order loads." She smiled kinda evilly at that last bit.

"We probably shouldn't order too mu-"

"She should have been more specific then." She interrupted smirking at her petty revenge and reaching over for the phone.

Releasing she probably couldn't talk her sister out of it and it was nice to see her smiling all things considering, she shrugged and added her order. "We could also order dessert…"

Her sister just grinned.

* * *

Pulling on some tracksuit bottoms and a loose shirt after finishing her shower and reorganising her dirty clothes. Sophia then grabbed a couple ice packs, that she was really glad she packed, and lowered herself onto the bed. Lying on her stomach, she activated the ice pack before awkwardly placing them on her back with her left arm. It was good she was pretty ambidextrous but it didn't help that everything hurt.

Reaching her hand back under her pillow, she rested her head partly on her arm and pillow combined and tried to relax enough to sleep. Either the room was relatively sound proof or the lightning women were actually being considerate and quiet. Closing her eyes, Sophia eventually drifted into a light sleep.

Click.

Her eyes flew open at the door handle clicking down, hand reaching and grasping for the gun hidden under her pillow as she forced her injured arm to push herself up. She spun around clicking off the safety and pointing the gun at the frozen intruders, illuminated by the lamp she'd forgotten to turn off. There stood the two sekirei, one dressed in the provided gown so at least they wouldn't have freaked out the room service staff. Groaning as the pain caught up with her and realising they weren't a threat to her at the moment she went to lower her gun.

"What the hell is wrong with you! Pointing a gun at us!" Hikari yelled, making a threatening step forward and sparking slightly.

 _"This woman is going to give me a migraine."_ She thought before continuing to lower her arm and respond tiredly, "You're the one bursting into my room, uninvited."

She huffed crossing her arms as if she didn't want to agree with the human in any way. "It's not my fault this is the only bathroom and we thought you'd be asleep."

"So you didn't knock?" She asked wearily, noticing her ice packs had slid off when she'd sat up and went to move them off the bed now they were used up.

"Well we-" She started angrily.

"I really needed to use the bathroom." Hibiki says, smiling apologetically before rushing to the ensuite, hoping her sister wouldn't start a fight while she was gone.

Clicking the safety back on, she returned the gun to its previous position and Hikari tapped her foot impatiently, looking annoyed. _"A common look on her face it seems. Maybe the wind blew the wrong way when we met."_ She smiled slightly to herself while her back was to the sekirei.

"Why do you even have a gun in your bed? Seems a bit weird and paranoid." She accused.

"Well excuse me, we all can't summon lightning whenever we need to defend ourselves so I'll stick with keeping my gun close by thanks." Sophia snarked, sending Hikari a challenging look.

She huffed in response. "I already told you we can't kill you without dying so you don't need a gun around us." There seemed to be a slight hint of hurt in her voice at the implication.

"You can still zap me." She stated coldly, noticing the loophole to that statement and Hikari had the decency to flinch at the implied torture she could enact.

"I wouldn't -" She stopped as she looked down at her feet, apparently unable to finish that knowing that if this human crossed them or hurt her sister she might electrocute her. Not enough to kill her but enough to hurt. It wouldn't be the first time.

"Exactly." She looked at the guilty but slightly determined look on the other woman's face. _"Least she seems to have some remorse, that could be useful."_ She thought before continuing out loud, "And anyway, who says you're the only reason I keep the gun on me?"

Just as she asked that, Hibiki came out and her sister quickly walked over and entered the ensuite, all but slamming the door behind her. Looking slightly concerned but not entirely surprised, she walked back across towards the doorway. "Sorry we woke you ash-" Hibiki bit her lip.

"It's fine, wasn't much of a sleep anyway. Just knock next time." She tried to roll her shoulders without wincing too much. "Did you eat?" She asked after a long silence.

"Yes thank you, the food was lovely." She smiled back, trying not to look too guilty about all the food they ordered as she pulled the gown tighter around herself.

Sophia just grunted in response before the other twin exited the ensuite and made her way out the room, her sister following with a 'good night' thrown over her shoulder.

"Night." She said, preparing to lie down as soon as the door closed. She looked to the bathroom wondering if it was worth moving but decided against it. Sophia also thought about getting under the covers but didn't want to restrict her injured body if something happened. However, before she could settle back down a knock came on her door.

Sighing for the billionth time today, she called out, "Yes?"

Hibiki cracked open the door saying, "Sorry to disturb you but I thought you might like this." She brought over a bowl and placed in Sophia's now empty hand.

Looking down at the bowl of ice cream, Sophia gave an amused exhale at the absurdity of alien creature giving ice cream after she tried to slit her throat earlier. "Thanks." She said meeting the sekirei's eyes which somehow seemed to hold no ill will towards her.

Smiling back at the ashikabi, she nodded and left once more. Placing the bowl in her lap, she idly picked up the spoon. _"This is definitely one of my weirder jobs, if this even counts as a job anymore."_


End file.
